Study Hints At Time Before Big Bang

canadian_right informs us that scientists from Caltech have found hints of a time before the Big Bang while studying the cosmic microwave background. Not only does the study hint at something pre-existing our universe, the researchers also postulate that everything we see was created as a bubble pinched off from a previously existing universe. This conjecture turns out to shed light on the mystery of the arrow of time. Quoting the BBC's account: "Their model suggests that new universes could be created spontaneously from apparently empty space. From inside the parent universe, the event would be surprisingly unspectacular. Describing the team's work at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) in St Louis, Missouri, co-author Professor Sean Carroll explained that 'a universe could form inside this room and we'd never know.'"

Comments

How dramatic do they want to be?

[Ritontor]

At least they're thinking big, I guess. Like, you know, on the scale that makes God seem insignificant.

"our big bang started our time and space"

[circletimessquare]

spoken like a religious devotee, not a scientist

this is science's way of dealing with those who take something as literal truth that is not totally proven:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/10/science/10auct.html?ex=1370750400&en=c9d19e51a82df186&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

and i can see in the grammar nazi like way your brittle mind sputters over the definition of the word "centrism" that you can't think very well abstractly, evwrything must be literal and cut and dry

there are unknowns and specious interpretations. the "truth" of the big bang is full of them. i await the dismantling of the big bang, it is too anthropocentric, too old testament in its creation mystique

Re:What did you expect to see?

[Fred_A]

I'm pretty sure that you could take any axis and get around 10% difference in fluctuations, it is fairly randomly dispersed after all, this should happen. Quite. Quite wrong, actually.

If you are measuring the cosmic background radiation, you are detecting photons.

If the background radiation is truely random, and you sample 100 photons, the chances of one 'side' being 10% stronger than the other are not that unlikely. Hello ? This is exactly what everybody has been saying all along.